


Nightlight

by wishieingstar



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Literal Sleeping Together, M/M, Nyctophobia
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 08:20:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,797
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29132448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wishieingstar/pseuds/wishieingstar
Summary: Koushi is waiting for him patiently. Koushi, with the tired eyes, propped up on his side with one elbow. Koushi, who looks lovingly at him despite the sleep he rubs out of his eyes with his hands, and the taste of strong coffee on his lips every morning. He hesitates.Daichi has always been afraid of the dark, but he finds his nightlight.
Relationships: Sawamura Daichi/Sugawara Koushi
Kudos: 24





	Nightlight

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [boy-fairy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/27935481) by [yoonjar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/yoonjar/pseuds/yoonjar). 



> Hello, this is my first fanfic and first fic on Ao3. I just wanted to do something for Daisuga day and dedicate something to my favourite ship in Haikyuu!! Hope you enjoy it!

Daichi has always been afraid of the dark. 

The inky blackness of his own room was something he hated to come home to. He hated how he could trace the outlines of ghosts, while just lying in his bed. He hated how shadows and lights would flit across the ceiling through his window. He hated how he could imagine things not really there staring at him from the corner of his room. There were monsters and gods in the dark, and Daichi had known them all without seeing them. 

Every night, his fear plagued him and clung to his skin, and without fail, he would spend at least a small eternity staring up at the black canvas of night, hoping to fall asleep before he becomes the second Icarus, so close to the sun and yet finding death in the night. The night was for reincarnation, he remembers. His grandma told him one time, on a cold autumn night. Daichi remembers clenching the smooth fabric of her skirt in his fists as she stroked his hair when night came. People would die and by morning, rise. Yet Daichi had only died. He goes to school with shadowed eyes and smiles, saying he had been studying. It was true. He had been studying. Studying the way the night kept him petrified under the sheets. What a thing it was, to turn flesh into stone. Daichi understood none of it.

He found it ironic really. Koushi always told him he was the earth. He had his roots deep, grounded to hold them up to the sun. He is there when everything else is not. He stays.

(Only just a week ago, he isolated himself to the couch in their living room. Everything is a cycle of skin chafing against fabric and bright moonlight. Sometimes his arms hit cold, hardwood floor and his skin curls unpleasantly without Koushi's warmth. Here he is, no matter how many times he closes his eyes, he cannot fall asleep. He wants to sleep. Next to Koushi. Next to to world. But he can't. This dark seeps into his pores and in between the gaps of his joints. He feels like the darkness covers him inside out, rather than outside in.)

Here he is, letting the night chase a space between them. How many nights has Koushi stayed up with him? How many nights of sleep will he lose? Koushi hasn't said a word. He just exists and Daichi wants to cry, just looking at him standing around making coffee for just one in the morning. (He tries taking caffeine out to see if it helps. No luck) He wonders why Koushi doesn't think of himself as the earth instead. 

Tonight, he stands in the doorway, feet rooted into the ground, and stares at the light switch. He doesn't dare reach out for it, even as Koushi, his beautiful, beautiful Koushi, is slipping under the covers and patting the empty spot on the bed next to him. He is sinking, his skin melts into the cracks between the polished floor. He is heavy, gravity favours him more than than sleep. Daichi does the only thing he can think of. He studies Koushi's face.

(Koushi's face has always been a favourite resting place for his eyes. He gently traces with his eyes, over the crest of his head, into the creases of his smile, in the heaven where his beauty mark rests. As if Koushi wasn't already blindingly beautiful, the universe decided to give him a mark to prove it. Daichi likes to acknowledge it with his lips. He also likes to think that marrying Sugawara Koushi would make him an expert at telling his emotions, behind that chocolate sweet smile of his that melts anything and everything away. He tries looking.)

No trace of anger. Just concern. The blanket is creased and smelling faintly of the plum shower gel Koushi loves to use liberally with warm water. He watches Koushi's pale, slender fingers weave a fold into the blanket and lifts it up, making room for him to slid in. For a moment, he can do nothing but look. There, in his lover's fingers, is a space between stars. 

Koushi is waiting for him patiently. Koushi, with the tired eyes, propped up on his side with one elbow. Koushi, who looks lovingly at him despite the sleep he rubs out of his eyes with his hands, and the taste of strong coffee on his lips every morning. He hesitates. 

"Dai, I know what you're thinking. You can turn it off and hop into bed. I'm here." Koushi sits there, outline bright in the dark. Daichi can hardly breathe. 

Earthquake, a crumbling. His resolve dissolves under the power of love. All the heart-straining, world-shaking fear is swallowed in the wake of love. Daichi's gaze hangs on Koushi. Caramel eyes on wood. He feels his body robotically moving to turn the switch off, stiff and lifeless. Blanket on skin, hand in hand. Koushi, moving faster than the sun through the sky, has his arms around him. Chin on head. Lips against his hair. One time, two times, three times. Daichi feels like he's looking up, and that he's counting stars, in the night. He breathes in the scent of Koushi. Warm fruit, summer and clean laundry. He smells like fresh things. Beautiful things. Things Daichi wanted to hold next to his heart for the rest of his life. He breathes, he breathes.

His ear is pressed to Koushi's chest. He thinks, fingers tracing patterns on Koushi's back. Separated by only his skin, flesh and ribs, is the one organ Koushi has used the most in his life. He is giving, always giving. He gives his place to Kageyama, even if it means watching from the sidelines. He gives his time to teaching his juniors, even if it means less time for himself. He gives his everything, even if it means not always getting everything back. 

He gives himself to Daichi, too, and Daichi wonders if this boy ever stops giving. He mumbles something into the fabric of his lover's shirt. 

"What did you say? I can't hear you when you're all snuggled into my shirt." 

He hears the laugh in his voice, and the worry. This boy, the boy who holds the sky up by his shoulders, is worried. His boy, is worried. Daichi shoots up a quick prayer, and prays he is not burdening this angel beside him.

"I'm sorry." 

"For what, darling?" 

"For being stupid. For always bothering you. You can't even sleep in peace." 

"Who said I wasn't in peace?" 

Daichi pulls away and tilts his gaze to meet Koushi's. His coffee-coloured eyes swirl with concern, worry and love. Still there, Daichi thinks. Still there. 

"I'm at peace with you." Daichi feels the pad of Koushi's thumb tracing his hair line and then running across his scalp soothingly. Their legs tangle together under the blanket. Daichi can't help but think he must be the luckiest man in the world. To hold Sugawara Koushi in his arms. To hear his voice beside his ear. He ducks his head so Koushi cannot see the rain that surfaces in his eyes, to meet the ethereal being made of clouds that lies next to him. 

"Are you crying?" 

Daichi shakes his head, but he can't help the way his hands frantically rub at his eyes. He wants to see Koushi, whole and clear, in all of his beauty. 

"Don't cry, love. You have me as much as I have you. We will be together in this life. And the next, and the next, and the..." Koushi plants a kiss for every time he repeats. On the crown of his head. The tip of his nose. The corner of his mouth. The arch of his cheekbone. The curve of his jaw. Daichi has never felt so loved. He loves Koushi, with all his heart, soul. 

On a prayer, he hopes Koushi can feel how much he loves him through his mouth, without having to say a word. Daichi was always a man of action, Koushi often teases. He smiles, and kisses him back. Between his eyes. On his forehead. Over his beauty mark. Beside his ear. Over his heart. 

And Koushi knows. He knows this as much as he knows the sky can be black and blue and crimson and gold. He holds his lover in his arms and hopes he knows that he will love him. Even when the sky is clouded and grey, he will find a way through. He will always make a way back to Daichi. He always has, through the countless sets during practice, through the sneaking through the window when insomnia hits hard, through the reaching into each other's pockets during winter. Koushi has always made a way back to Daichi. He knows, that even the earth must crumble sometimes to grow itself. He will cradle the earth when it does. He promises this. 

Their eyes meet. For a moment, the whole night goes silent. He shifts in the bed to gaze at Koushi properly, his face in his cupped hands. Crystal water in glass chalice. Light through clear windows. They are so helplessly fragile and endlessly beautiful together. Together. Daichi doesn't hear the dark. He doesn't see the dark. He doesn't feel the dark. All he is surrounded with, is light. Koushi. Light. He may have died in the night, but tonight, he is reborn. 

Koushi gazes back at him, gazes past his eyes, into his head, into his soul. He thinks, that all his life, he had never really looked at something, or someone, this intently. Tonight, however, will be the first time. Daichi will be an exception. He faces Daichi and he looks. He looks and takes him in, tucks him into every corner of his mind, takes him by the hand into his heart. He does not love Daichi despite his fears. He loves Daichi, and that is it.

Tonight, and countless other nights, Daichi tells Koushi, he loves him. And tonight and countless other nights, Koushi says it back. Daichi was half right at the start. There is a god in this darkness. And how he shines. Daichi looks and holds and keeps him and his beautiful light inside this breakable ribcage of his, just as Koushi keeps the earth of him tucked firmly into his veins. They will be broken and whole, but only in each other.

They fit into each other, with no distance between them. Tonight, stars collided.

It is still midnight outside their windows but this time, fear has long evaporated from inside Daichi's head. It is because of the light. His light.

(Koushi shines-

-and Daichi finds his way out of the dark.)


End file.
